Double the fun!

The refeshed New Zealand Maths Curriculum for 6 months to 1 year expects ākonga to have some basic number facts memorised. This includes addition and subtraction facts up to 10 (for example 7 + 3 = 10 and 10 - 4 = 6) and also doubles and halves to 10. Memorising basic facts can give children an advantage when it comes to doing calculations efficiently. This knowledge also adds to their number sense, enabling them to estimate more accurately or spot when a solution 'looks right'. 

Recently, we've been working on our doubles. With much of our maths learning, we start by giving ākonga concrete experiences of new concepts. 

Ladybird spots was our way into thinking and talking about doubles. We explored how a ladybird has the same number of spots on each wing. In the picture below, we made a ladybird with 2 spot on each wing; 4 spots in total.

Here, we're making a ladybird with 6 spots on each wing: 6 + 6 is 12 or double 6 is 12.

And here is how we showed double 4 or 4 + 4 = 8.

Having opportunties to solve problems and explore numbers can really make the learning stick. Here, we asked the children to find as many doubles up to double 10 as they could. Numicon is such a great tool for working with doubles because each piece gives a concrete representation of a number and two pieces the same can be put side by side to represent a double.

 

Working with buddies, the children were able to discover all these doubles facts.

Ākonga began to make some connections with previous learning. They noticed that all of our doubles were in our skip counting in 2s sequence. They also noticed that all of the doubles were even numbers (this is easy to spot using Numicon since the even number pieces have flat tops, while the odds have 'chimneys').

To lock in the learning, everyone had a chance to build and write lots of ladybird doubles.

After all this thinking about doubles, we couldn't help noticing and counting these doubles that appeared when we took our shoes off to go to the library that afternoon.

It's exciting to see our children making these discoveries and connecting their learning to the world around them. 

We will keep practising these number facts. You can support this learning at home, too.

• Have a go at making and saying finger doubles. You can do this by holding up a number of fingers and asking your child to match it. 'Look, I have 3 fingers and you have 3 fingers. How many altogether?' You can also play this game using a reflection in a mirror to make the double, for example at teeth brushing time.
• Games like Pairs and Dominoes build awareness of doubles. 
• Look out for and talk about doubles you might spot when you're out and about. These might be two of the same thing or two of the same number. For example, cars have 2 wheels on one side and 2 on the other, making 4 altogether. Bees have 3 legs on one side and 3 on the other, making 6 altogether. What doubles can you see when you open a carton of eggs or unwrap a bar of chocolate? Soon, you'll be seeing doubles everywhere!